Stuff Dreams Are Made Of (29 page)

“Nobody here but us chickens, Skipper.”

In my high school history class we had a chapter or a page or maybe just a paragraph on Napoleon Bonaparte. The French general had a quote that I memorized, not because I understood
it, but because I thought it was cool. Now, I understood it. And it made perfect sense.
Men are moved by only two things. Fear and self-interest
. I think that talk-show host Barry Romans said the same thing. Fear and self-interest. And I was in agreement. That quote pretty much summed up the last three days.

I walked in and the desk was directly in front of me. The computer that Styles had hacked into was sitting, totally exposed, on top of the desk, and to the right was a set of filing cabinets. No safe. Because the money was picked up as soon as it was collected. My bank took five days to process and cash a check I deposited. Cashdollar could get an instant credit. James often said it. You’ve got to have money to make money.

Styles was pulling open drawers and clawing through files. “We’re going to find something. Start looking.”

I had no idea what I was looking for.

“Skipper, go into the other room. See what you can find. I’m going to hack the computer.”

A narrow entrance led to the second half of the trailer. It appeared to be more of the living quarters, and as I walked in I saw two vinyl recliners, a flat-screen television, a bar, and two bookshelves. There must have been thirty or forty bottles of booze behind the laminated wood bar. I felt like pouring myself a drink. Or two or three. And again, I didn’t have a clue as to what I should look for.

I walked behind the bar, a narrow area with a sink. I shot a quick look over my shoulder, imagining what would happen if we got caught.

The crowd noise from the big tent outside was muffled but loud, and I caught myself listening, straining to hear any sound that wasn’t contained in that tent. At the first sign of anyone discovering us, I wanted to be ready to bolt. A large cabinet was beneath the wall-mounted flat-screen television and I opened the right door. There were dozens of DVDs. The titles that caught my eye were several movies that James and I considered our favorites.
Dumb and Dumber
,
Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure
,
Midnight Cowboy
, and
Talladega Nights
:
The Ballad of Ricky Bobby
. The second shelf contained more of the same, but a couple titles I’d only heard about.
Star Whores
,
Laying Private Ryan
, and some others I couldn’t believe had been invented.

From the muffled cheering, I was sure that Cashdollar had been announced, and had probably taken the stage. I looked behind the furniture, still not sure what I was looking for. A three-tiered bookshelf was set into the rear wall, and I glanced at several of the titles. Most of them were what I would consider religious works.
The Record of Christian Work, Paul: A Work In Progress, Institution of the Christian Religion
, and others.

I scanned the three shelves and turned to the outer room. I can’t say what caused me to look back at the shelves, but there, on the top shelf, was a gold book. A Bible. I slowly walked back and, stretching, I reached as high as I could and pulled down the large volume. It felt surprisingly light in my hand. The roar of the congregation grabbed my attention.

“Daron.”

“Skipper.” I walked to the other room.

“Daron, you’ve got to see —”

He didn’t even look up. “Here, on the computer. Man, the other night I didn’t look deep enough. Listen to this —” He
looked up for just a brief moment. “LeRoy writes this shit. I can’t believe he keeps this on record.”

“What? What did he write?”

“Listen. You’re not going to believe it.”

I listened.

“The crusade has led us to this. Fred Long. Enemy combatant killed in the war. Michael Bland, enemy combatant. Killed in the war. Barry Romans, enemy combatant, killed in the war. Walter and Stan, trusted sacrificed soldiers.”

“Jesus.”

“Jesus. Anyone could copy this. Download this. The man is crazy. I can’t believe it. I fucking cannot believe it.”

I shuddered and my hands were shaking. We both looked at each other, realizing the implications.

“Skip, we need some more evidence.”

“Christ, you’ve almost got a signed confession. Daron, we’ve got to get out of here. This is bullshit.”

“Give me something else.”

“Did you hear me?”

“Try to find something. We need to nail these guys.”

“Why?”

Styles ignored me. “Look, here.” I tenatively walked behind the desk. There on the screen was a short paragraph, a note that LeRoy had written to himself.

Daron Styles. Reason for Bland’s overdose. $800 in
cash that came up missing. Styles killed Bland for the
money. When feds start getting warm, give them
information on Styles.

“That’s why.”

And if they thought we were spying on them, they’d find a way to turn over information on us. James, Em, and me. Em had
possibly killed Bruce Crayer with a frying pan and, if they had a clue about that, we could be in big trouble. So, like a dumb-ass, I decided to listen to Styles and look for whatever I could find.

Walking back into the living area, I listened carefully. Every quiet moment from the tent made my heart jump. Every eruption of applause caused me to catch my breath. My hand caressed the cover of the golden Bible. I hoped it would calm me a little, but it didn’t. The cover on the book was leather and it had been dyed a deep gold. The letters on the front were raised and simply read, T
HE
H
OLY
B
IBLE
. Was it Cashdollar’s book? It was beautiful, almost awe inspiring, but our brief conversations about the book and its importance as to what had happened to us seemed insignificant. This was the real deal.

“Hey, Daron.” I shouted in a coarse whisper. He needed to see this.

No answer. It occurred to me that he’d left. I wouldn’t put it past him to leave me, if he thought there was the least bit of trouble. And he’d just uncovered a boatload of trouble. I glanced at the doorway. There was no sign of him.

Running my hand over the gilt-edged pages, I realized I was holding something of true beauty.

“Hey, Daron.” Nothing. Then a sound outside the trailer. Maybe footsteps or a shovel turning over dirt.

I flipped open the first couple of pages and rested on Genesis.
Chapter 45
, verse 18 should have been one of Cashdollar’s slogans.
Ye shall eat the fat of the land
. I opened the book partway and I swear my heart stopped. I coughed to start it again. The hollow shape of a handgun was cut into the pages. The shape was there. The gun was not.

For at least a minute I gazed at the perfect shape of a handgun carved out of the pages in the book. I tried to grasp the situation. Cashdollar, carrying the book everywhere he went. Cashdollar, carrying a gun, even to his revival meetings. Cashdollar, being in Washington, D.C. the same day that Senator Fred Long was shot, carrying his gun-toting Bible. Who would ever question a minister with a Bible? Who could ever question his intentions, question his geographic location, question his reason for anything? For God’s sake, the guy was Preston Cashdollar. Beyond reproach.

Finally, I walked into the main room, the book in my hand. “Daron,” he sat in the small swivel office chair behind the desk, eyes staring, his life having oozed from the deep, blood-red gash in his throat.

Deacon Thomas LeRoy stood next to him, an eight-inch knife in his hand. “Ah, Brother Skip. So you are one of the culprits as well?”

“Jesus.”

“Praise him. He is why we’re here.”

I tried to catch my breath. Styles was dead.

“Put down the book, brother.”

“You killed Daron?” It wasn’t registering.

“He broke into our office. And, we have suspicion that he may have murdered a gentleman who used to work for us.”

“Michael Bland?”

“You see?” LeRoy, held up the knife, waving it in the air. “Mr. Moore, it’s obvious you’re involved as well. When I call the police and tell them that you broke into our office — that you both may have committed murders, well —”

“Murder?”

“Bruce Crayer, Mr. Moore. I think someone in your little band may have killed him.”

It was tough, grasping the situation. Styles was dead. And LeRoy was blaming me for Crayer’s possible death. All of this in a matter of seconds. I closed my eyes for a brief moment and tried to regroup. Not more than two minutes ago Styles was reading a list of the sins of Thomas LeRoy, LeRoy’s startling accusation regarding Styles, oh my God, Styles, and now —

“You killed Walter, the bodyguard.” I blurted it out. He’d never admit to that.

LeRoy shook his head slowly. Almost as if he disapproved of my statement. “Walter was a soldier in the war.”

I stood in the room, physically frozen, with the Bible clutched tightly in my hand. “A soldier?”

“Let me explain. In Christ’s work, in the Lord’s mission, all is fair. Our mission, the Cashdollar crusade, is to destroy the oppressor.”

“The senator? Fred Long?”

He captured me with his cold gaze, and he tapped the blade of the knife in his palm.

“And Barry Romans?”

I tried to look into his eyes, to see if I was getting through.
They were lifeless. And the steel blade kept beat to a silent tune.

I couldn’t help myself. I had to keep going. “And this has nothing to do with the amount of cash you receive? Come on. Every time you pull one of your stunts, your donations go through the roof. You and Cashdollar figured out that when people die, you make money. A lot of money. Am I right?”

I was shaking. Styles was four feet from me, blood running from his neck. To make it worse, his eyes were open, as if he was taking this all in. It was all I could do to keep it together.

“You broke into our office, Eugene.” The guy had done his homework. He even knew my given name.

I tried not to look at the lifeless body of Daron Styles. I had to keep LeRoy going. The longer he talked, the better my chance for living. Goddamn James. He’d put me in a life-or-death situation, and I silently swore I’d never, ever, do anything he suggested again. I had to pin this guy, and I did just that.

“Do you know we saw you? Saw you shoot Walter in the head?”

He was quiet for a moment. The sheer bulk of the man kept me on one side of the room. While his tailored suit, the flawless way his jacket hung from his frame, was impressive, I still realized he was probably six foot four and weighed 230 pounds, and I was sure he could toss me around the room like a sack of potatoes. That and the fact that he had a sizeable weapon in his hand made me decide to keep the desk between us.

“There are agencies that are against the reverend. They’d like to bring him down. It was time to disarm those agencies.”

Disarm? “So you made up the story about Cashdollar’s death threat? It was all a way for you to lay the blame for the murders on someone else.” I felt the perspiration soaking my T-shirt, beading on my forehead, and running down my face. And LeRoy, looking very cool.

He stared at me, still tapping the knife blade in his palm.

“Made up? I can tell you that every day of his Christian life, the reverend has had death threats.”

That was probably true. He’d pissed off a lot of people.

“You had the bodyguard, Walter, shoot him in the leg. Just to make it look like the threat was real. Then, you shot the bodyguard with Cashdollar’s gun. We saw it, and we bought into it. We thought you were killing the guy who shot Cashdollar to protect the reverend. It was all smoke, wasn’t it?”

It struck me again. Like Styles had said, you can see something plain as day, and not see it at all. Like watching two men drag Styles from the office when it wasn’t Styles. Like hearing Styles say he took the money from a dead man, when he never said that at all.

“And then, then when you laid it on Stan we knew the whole thing was a set up.”

“Should I applaud?” Tap, tap, tap. “Should I congratulate you?” Tap, tap, tap. “Should I confess to whatever you are suggesting?”

“No.” I tried to give him the same cold, calculating look that he was giving me. “You don’t have to.” I held the front cover of the book and let the gold Bible fall open, the cut-out shape of the gun hanging down for anyone to see. I would bet my last beer that the shape fit a Glock nine-millimeter gun perfectly and, until this morning, I didn’t even know what a Glock was.

“Strong words from someone who just broke into our office. I think you need to pray that God accepts your soul, brother Eugene.”

“Do you understand what I said? Until you got up in front of your congregation and said that Stan had killed the bodyguard, we were buying into the whole thing. And now what are we supposed to do?”

“Die.” He took two steps toward me, the knife in front of him.

“Wait.” I needed to stop him.

He hesitated.

“Did Stan have anything at all to do with this?”

LeRoy smiled. For the first time.

“Stan? Stan wouldn’t have understood any of it. In case you hadn’t noticed, he wasn’t the brightest bulb on the circuit. Stan and the full-timers were loyal only because of the money. When we wanted them to help us with a project, I would call Stan and he would get them all together. They were paid quite well. Money, women —”

“He was a stooge?”

LeRoy shook his head. “A soldier. Not a very bright soldier, but a soldier nonetheless.”

“You made it look like suicide. You used Cashdollar’s gun. His Glock. So Stan appears to be the master criminal who killed Fred Long. The guy who shot Barry Romans.”

“He was a soldier. We needed him to do his part.”

“His part?” I watched LeRoy’s eyes. I’d always heard that you can tell what someone is going to do if you watch his eyes. But all I could see were black pupils that stared directly back at me.

“This is getting tedious.” He took a step toward the desk and I backed up. “Stan will be accused of the murders. It was necessary for the ministry.”